Screenwriting From Iowa

Steve McQueen has been dead for thirty years now, but they still call him the king of cool. Last night I watched The Sand Pebbles which was McQueen’s only Oscar-nominated role.
After the film I did some checking to see where the king of cool came from and guess what I found out? He was born [...]

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In the last few days I’ve glanced at filmmaking from Japan. I followed some rabbit trails and it’s lead me right back to the Midwest and David Bordwell over in Madison, Wisconsin. I have quoted Bordwell before, but was unaware that he wrote a whole book on one of Japan’s greatest filmmakers. The bad news [...]

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In the 1950s, while Akira Kurosawa was in Japan making two of the most highly regarding films in cinematic history (Ikira and The Seven Samurai) there was another filmmaker in Japan who was making a film with one of the most memorable and recognizable characters in cinematic history—Godzilla. Ishiro Honda, the director (and co-writer) of [...]

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In the 1950s, while Akira Kurosawa was in Japan making two of the most highly regarding films in cinematic history there was another filmmaker in Japan who was making a film with one of the most memorable and recognizable characters in cinematic history—Godzilla. Ishiro Honda, the director (and c0-writer) of the first Godzilla film actually [...]

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I wrote in my last post that many Japanese films are about respect and honor. Akira Kurosawa, who was the youngest of eight children, was born in Toyko in 1910 and would go on as a film director and screenwriter to gain the respect and honor of some of the greatest filmmakers in history including [...]

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It’s been a while since I took a screenwriting road trip so today seems like a good day. Yesterday I mentioned Louie Psihoyos and his Oscar-winning documentary The Cove which was shot in Japan so that seems like a fitting place to head.
My knowledge of Japanese cinema is limited but I know enough to say they [...]

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“Every cell of your body has to be aligned so that you’re making the best possible image.”
Photographer and Oscar-winning filmmaker Louie Psihoyos
His name is Louie Psihoyos. He won an Oscar Sunday. And he’s originally from Iowa.
That’s the short version.
If Louie Psihoyos doesn’t sound like a traditional Midwestern German Lutheran name to you, you’d be correct.  [...]

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Hitchcock loved The Hurt Locker? As in Alfred Hitchcock? Really? Hasn’t he been dead for like 30 years? Yes, I guess I should have said that “Hitchcock would have loved The Hurt Locker”—but that’s a long title, and less interesting. So why do I think the master of suspense and a psychological thrillers would have [...]

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“I devoted myself to writing for years without representation or a promise of anything. And there were times when I felt quite down about my prospects.”
Geoffrey Fletcher
Geoffrey Fletcher walked away with an Oscar for his first produced screenplay, Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire. That part is true.
But what is also true [...]

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Last week I was asked to do my first guest blogging by Debra Eckerling on her excellent Write On Online website. I appreciated the opportunity and wrote the following post after making the observation that there was a heavy dose of films beyond what is known as the thirty mile zone in L.A. (As a side [...]

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